Thursday, July 08, 2010

According to the Yemen Post, at least 10 Jewish girls have married Muslim men in Yemen, says the Chief Rabbi of Yemen, Yahya Yusuf. Note that the traffic is always one-way, necessitating the Jewish girl to convert to Islam. None of the Jews still remaining in Yemen will admit that these marriages and conversions have been carried out under pressure. In fact, according to the harrassed Rabbi of Raida, such marriages are 'normal.' How then to explain that the community sits shiva for the girl?

"In recent years, many love stories have spread between Jewish girls and Muslim males in Yemen, which ended in marriage.

"These occasions did not pass unnoticed, but rather witnessed a great uproar. Many outside parties got involved, in which some cases were reported to the U.S. Embassy in Sana’a, in an attempt by some extremist Jews to disengage families between those girls and their Muslim husbands.

"Al-Dar Kuwaiti newspaper opened the case ‘Yemen’s Jewish Girls Marriage to Muslim Men’, where it questioned the Jewish rabbi and leader of the Jewish community in Yemen, Yahya Yousuf, asking, do Jews find it critical for Muslims to marry Jewish girls?

"He replied that he doesn’t object this kind of marriage, adding that the objection of the Jewish community in the recent marriage of Laila, the latest young Jewish woman who got married to a Yemeni man, was not as a result of her identity as a Jew, but because she left her Jewish husband, after she was taken to him, then fled after she embraced Islam to marry a young Muslim called, Abdul-Rahman Al-Hodiqi.

"The Jewish Rabbi said that marriages which took place between Jewish females and Muslim males begin when the Jew girls convert to Islam and then they marry Muslim men.He said “The past years have witnessed nearly ten marriage ceremonies between Jewish girls and Muslim men in Yemen”.

"On the future of marital relations between the two sides, he said there are good Muslims and their life with their Jewish wife culminated in calmness and stability. On the other hand, others have no honor, according to his expression, where the husband treats his wife in a bad way after they have taken her from her family and after becoming a Muslim.

"About the future of the relationship of the Jewish families with their girls who became Muslims, Rabbi Yahya Yousuf said “It’s a normal relationship and there is nothing with that”.

"For his part, Rabbi, Yahya ibn Yaeesh, who lives in Raidah area, which houses the largest Jewish community in Yemen, believes that the marriages of Jewish girls to Muslims is normal and that these marriages are built on love, which happens between the two parties and ends with marriage.

"At the same time, he ruled out that there are religious grounds for such marriages, adding that “Jewish girl’s marriage to a Muslim is a desire generated on both sides in the marriage, further, Jewish women do not marry Muslims for Islam”.

"He added that there are a number of girls of the Jewish community who were married to Muslims after embracing Islam, as this phenomenon has become normal, after the Jewish community has gotten used to it, and that the phenomenon is not negative. If Yemeni Jews choose to travel to Israel, that means they choose to be in the lower class, and Israel turns their children into Zionists, which is an unrelated movement to the Jewish religion, because it is purely a racist movement, he said.

"If a Jewish women in Yemen ran away and announced that she converted to Islam and married a Muslim, always, the members of the Jewish community meet at the girl’s father house and give him condolence, considering the girl dead and that her life ended by her converting to Islam.The condolences continue for a full week, which is considered by Jews as sympathy for the girl’s family and to all Jews for losing one member of the Jews community."

I believe that the fathers had no choice. It would seem like I remember a story from the Torah that told of Jews needed to give away one of their children in order to have children to the people of the some tyrant or another. It's cruel and inhumane. All Muslim countries are. Sharia is evil and Mohammed is the most EVIL character of any book.

inter-religiouse marriage on love basis not grow. love is boil in a cup. love marriages should be stop to honor both religions.bartering daughter for safety means country law is weak.the last paras heart toutching that community gather father house to condolance. means parent and coommnuty not recognized that marriage of jew girl

I agree with you, zain - for centuries Muslims and Muslims have not intermarried, why should love suddenly be the overriding factor? And as you rightly point out, the community mourns the girl as if she were dead.There is one exception to these marriages, and that is the case of Laila who ran away from her Jewish husband to live with a Muslim who may have been her sweetheart. However, the facts are vague in this case and we may never really know the truth.

And do people in Yemen generally marry for love? Don't both Jews and Muslims arrange marriages for their children? (It's hard to imagine a Jewish father wanting his daughter to marry a Muslim and then be lost to the family and community).

Do not be so hateful, friends. Most of us use GD's name over anything we disaggree. In GD's name we curse others who have different visions than us. To me it's so childish and irresponsible. If we keep thinking the diversities among us, there will be no peace. Wake up ! If they convert to othe believe, it's their problems. Saying others faith, other's God or other's prophet bad are only going to make you bad as well. Insulting your integrity and intelegent.Just wake up and see the future ahead of us. It's not for us to judge others, it's God's perogative right. We are just dust in the wind who will die someday and go back to Hi

Neshama - Why would you think that? Why not think they were forced into it like Dinah was. After all, we're talking about Arabs/muzlims, are we not?

Unknown - who says "In GD's name we curse others who have different visions than us" - speak for yourself. That's what muzlims do - not Jews! Jews cherish G-d, a LOVING G-d, not the one you supposedly speak of, where every form of cruelty or human indecency is carried out in THAT god's name.

I see in United States that both Jewish and Arab Muslims once face to face feel very much at home with one another. They forget the rest in the room. I am a non Arab Muslim. I don't get the same hospitality from Jewish and Arabs like that. It is not that they are mean with me. But when they are together it is like Romeo and Juliet situation for them. My cousin is marrying a Jewish guy. I see no problem in that. In fact, we in the family are quite excited about it. Marriage is a personal choice. I don’t think marrying just for the sake of religion or culture can bring someone happiness.

I am shocked to read here that many Jewish women marry guys from Yemen. I was once liked by one from that country. His way of approaching me was Greek to me. So I felt intimidated by him. I guess Israeli Jewish and Arabs understand each other better due to some compatibility in viewpoints.

God will put love in the hart to override any religious belief , that is what love is all about. All of you who blog about this matter only talk about your discontent for what the creators love has brought together. I suggest you all ask the creator to cleans your harts!

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Introduction

In just 50 years, almost a million Jews, whose communities stretch back up to 3,000 years, have been 'ethnically cleansed' from 10 Arab countries. These refugees outnumber the Palestinian refugees two to one, but their narrative has all but been ignored. Unlike Palestinian refugees, they fled not war, but systematic persecution. Seen in this light, Israel, where some 50 percent of the Jewish population descend from these refugees and are now full citizens, is the legitimate expression of the self-determination of an oppressed indigenous, Middle Eastern people.This website is dedicated to preserving the memory of the near-extinct Jewish communities, which can never return to what and where they once were - even if they wanted to. It will attempt to pass on the stories of the Jewish refugees and their current struggle for recognition and restitution. Awareness of the injustice done to these Jews can only advance the cause of peace and reconciliation.(Iran: once an ally of Israel, the Islamic Republic of Iran is now an implacable enemy and numbers of Iranian Jews have fallen drastically from 80,000 to 20,000 since the 1979 Islamic revolution. Their plight - and that of all other communities threatened by Islamism - does therefore fall within the scope of this blog.)